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America's Media War On OWS

By Stephen Lendman
11-19-11

Early reporting was scant, dismissive, and offensive.
Much still belittles, denigrates and marginalizes a significant movement.

Fox News claims protesters don't pay taxes or know what
they want, are supported by Iran's Ayatollah Khamenei and Hugo Chavez,
and represent the lunatic left wing.

Bill O'Reilly quipped, "Do we have all kinds of
crackheads down there." He added that Zuccotti Park is "dirty
and filthy. There's rats running all over. There's dope all over the place.
They're having sex outside at night and all of this stuff."

Fox News reporter Charles Gasparino accused protesters
of embracing "communism and there is no doubt about it."

New York Times former executive editor Bill Keller ignored
global activism in a column about "good news," asking, "Bored
by the soggy sleep-ins and warmed-over anarchism of Occupy Wall Street?"

It's "been an act of desperation by the liberal
Left, which now represents a small minority of Americans in terms of ideology.
(It's) descended into anarchy. (It's) an anachronism, a wannabe 1960s-style
protest movement in an America that has moved on."

"And it is above all a symbol of a Left in decline
amidst an increasingly conservative nation that has had enough of the kind
of big government, anti-free market policies the liberal protesters crave."

Gardiner's right about one thing. Protesters want big
government for the rich ended. They rage against privatizing profits, socializing
losses, and trashing their rights for Wall Street and other corporate favorites.
Other than that, he pathetically inverted truth. So do many others like
him.

On November 15, Washington Post writers Eli Saslow and
Colum Lynch headlined, "The Occupy movement: More trouble than change?"
saying:

"The movement began as a protest of major economic
and political issues, but lately the most divisive issue has become the
protests themselves." Nationwide "encampments....have become
rife with problems of their own. There are sanitation hazards and drug
overdoses, even occasional deaths and sexual assaults."

In New York, OWS reported factually about one sexual
assault incident. The perpetrator was arrested. "From the moment the
incident was discovered to the present time, the survivor has been surrounded
by a network of allies and trained advocates offering resources to provide
emotional, medical, and legal support."

OWS activists support her. They're "saddened and
angered (about) some members of the media and public," blaming them
and the survivor for the assault. Getting it right isn't what major media
do. Their specialties include distortion, misreporting and ball-faced lying.

"Is this an occupation or an infestation? City officials
have long complained about the disruptiveness of Occupy Wall Streets, but
in the past week, police officers began raiding encampments in the middle
of the night, citing a public safety disaster."

At issue isn't public safety or other concerns. It's
serving wealth and power interests at the expense of beneficial social
change. Heroically, OWS activists pursue it.

"Recent news updates from Occupy protests read like
a crime blotter," including a shooting, a suicide, two drug overdoses,
a molotov cocktail, a sexual assault, sanitation, a rat infestation, violating
a noise ordinance, and more. "Democracy has rarely looked so messy."

Fact check

Hyperbole, exaggeration, and fabrication substitute for
accuracy and full disclosure. Whatever challenges entrenched power gets
vilified, pilloried, and discredited.

OWS represents direct democracy. It's entirely absent
at federal, state and local levels. Protesters want it restored. After
being evicted from New York's Zuccotti Park, one activist walked through
it with a sign reading, "Grand Reopening Under New Management."
There's no turning back now.

Her "Right Turn" columns appear regularly along
with other extremist Post writers. On November 15, her latest article headlined,
"Occupy movement deteriorates," saying:

"The left-wing punditocracy's fascination with the
Occupy Wall Street and its progeny movements has declined in inverse proportion
to the upswing in violence, mayhem and public filth stemming from those
about whom the left was cooing only a couple of weeks ago."

"No more are the liberal pundits interesting (sic)
in measuring the level of support for what they only weeks ago characterized
as a genuine political movement. Ignored are reports of sexual assaults.
No mention is made among the OWS cheerleaders of the latest effort to re-establish
order in Oakland, Calif, and Burlington, Vt."

"Funny how the left's assertion that this was a
grand political awakening has now gone down the memory hole....(L)eft-leaning
elites tried mightily to ignore the instances of anti-Semitism, violence
and fouling of public places. When that became impossible, they simply
chose to ignore the whole disgusting mess."

Fact check

Her comments lack truth and full disclosure. They feature
hyperbole, hate, misreporting, and uncalled for pejoratives. Nor does she
recognize real social, economic and political grievances. Why else would
growing millions want change?

Thousands of nationwide OWS activists represent them.
More join them daily. Rubin and others like her represent the malignancy
that's destroying America.

Shamefully, Washington Post editors put up with her.
Its journalism fell from grace after Woodward and Bernstein's heyday.

The New York Times also strayed from far June 13, 1971
when publisher Arthur Ochs Sulzberger said Pentagon Paper secrets "had
to be revealed....people had the right to know."

Belatedly in 1996, The Times said "Johnson Administration
(officials) systematically lied, not only to the public, but also to Congress,
about a subject of transcendental national interest and significance."

Major media journalism always fell short. It's hard imagining
how much lower it can sink. Why else are growing numbers turning elsewhere
for real news and information. Hopefully it's just a matter of time until
they all do.

Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago and can be reached at
lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net.

Also visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com and
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